178 _ The American Naturalist. [February, 
ceding by shape and character of the surface. In Æcidium euphorbie 
Gmel. they are similar to those of the preceding species, but the cells 
are shorter (15-20 by 19-25 p.), and not so strongly tuberculate. In 
many species characteristic differences may be be found. Why not 
describe them ?—HERBERT J. WEBBER, Lincoln, Neb. 
Peculiar Uredinez.—An abnormal fruit or seed, as a double 
apple or walnut, is always noted with curiosity by the most untrained 
observer ; so are also such stable but uncommon developments as the 
navel-orange. Among lower plants the microscopic spores frequently 
present peculiarities as curious as these, yet although examined usually 
by careful observers only, they are cones noted with anything more 
than usual interest. 
In working over Nebraska Uredinez I have observed a few curious 
variations from the usual forms that I think deserve particular mention. 
Puccinia flaccida B. & Br. (Pl. VIII., Fig. 1, Teleutospores; Fig. 2, 
Uredospores), a very peculiar species, presents the greatest and most 
uniform or stable peculiarity from the normal Puccinia, if I may so 
express it, of any species that it has been my fortune to examine. My 
specimens were collected at Lincoln, Nebraska, Oct. 13, 1889, on 
Barnyard-grass (Panicum crus-galli). The sori are amphigenous, 
linear-oblong, small and rather inconspicuous. The teleutospores are 
frequently one-celled (Fig. 1, g.), and in this case are of nearly the 
same size as the two-celled spores. The septi of two celled spores are 
in various positions, from almost horizontal to vertical. I have never 
found onewith a strictly horizontal septum. They are quite frequently 
almost vertical, each cell attached in part to the pedicel (Fig. 1 a. and f). 
In this case they appear as double Uromyces spores. In fact the species 
seems to me to more resemble a Uromyces than a Puccinia, the one- 
celled spores, which are always plentiful, being the normal form, and 
the two-celled spores, with the nearly vertical septi, double spores. 
About as near an approach to the normal Puccinia as usually occurs is 
represented by Fig. 1, d, and even here the partition is quite oblique. 
- Burrill, in “ Parasitic Fungi of Illinois, Uredinez,”’ p. 202, says O 
this: ‘*A most peculiar species. From two-thirds to three-fourths or 
more of all the teleutospores are septate, presenting the most varying 
and aberrant forms, So far as we are informed this has not been pre- 
viously reported from America, but a comparison with specimens 
kindly furnished by Dr. M. C. Cook of Puccinia flaccida B. & Br. from 
Ceylon, leaves no doubt of the specific identity. The American speci- 
mens only differ in possessing more undivided and, upon an average, 
narrower teleutospores, with somewhat thicker pedicels.” 
